Come Hell or High Water!
by supernaturaljunkiejude
Summary: Can Dean face his own demons as long as he remembers what YED said in AHBL2? Will the brothers be honest with each other? With themselves?


_**Come Hell or High Water!!**_

Dean sat on the bed closest to the door, the weapons he'd finished cleaning spread across the bright blue, cloud-covered bedspread. Glancing around the light blue interior of their latest lodgings, still unsure of how he felt about the big, fluffy, white clouds the motel owner had cheerily applied to any and all flat surfaces. If heaven looked like this for eternity, Dean would happily remain on earth for the next year. Damn, maybe this place would even make hell look more appealing.

A frown crossed his handsome, tired face as he thought of the upcoming demon hunt. Certainly this thing had to be stopped; already fourteen people had succumbed to the malicious acts it perpetrated. Without even looking up, Dean addressed Sam, who stood silently looking out the window as the beautiful, orange sunset washed over the parking lot of the Blue Skies Motel.

"So, Sam, how're we gonna contain this thing for the exorcism? Figure we'll be catching it on the fly, no way to do a Devil's Trap. Got any ideas?"

Without even taking a breath, the words tumbled easily from Sam's lips. A simple answer, "We've got the new Colt. We kill the thing."

Taken aback momentarily by the simplicity with which Sam made the declaration, Dean lifted his head incredulously to stare at this new Sam, the once sympathetic younger brother being somewhere else, simmering on a back burner. Was this 'his' Sam, the hunter who had always preached caution with human prey, speaking now of taking this thing out as if swatting an irritating insect, without any concern for the human the demon inhabited?

"Sammy, what the hell is wrong with you lately? I don't understand you anymore." The question had been in the back of Dean's mind a lot lately.

"What the hell is that supposed to mean, Dean?" Sam spun his giant frame from the window with a dancer's practiced grace, his blue-green eyes instantly challenging his older brother's confused-looking green ones. "C'mon, explain your words!"

Thinking fast, realizing the desperate need to choose his words carefully, Dean paused for a moment. He, sure as shit, didn't need a pissed off Sam stomping off into the sunset alone, like he had a couple of other times. Those little episodes had nearly ended in disaster, first at the hands of Meg and that friggin' scarecrow and then with vicious grenade-wielding bastard, Gordon.

_Yeah, and we all know how well Sam and I do separately! Not even considering Cold Oak… Well, here goes nothing…_

"It's just that… um… Before, you know… " Dean hesitated.

Sam glared defiantly, impatiently towering above the seated older hunter. "Yeah? Before when?"

Sam was so damned close he swore he could hear the gears shifting inside Dean's head! Something had been sticking in Dean's craw lately. Sam sensed it. That something seemed to bother Dean nearly as much as Dean's demonic deal was upsetting Sam.

There were unspoken questions standing between them. Questions that seemed to add layer upon layer to that brick wall Dean had so skillfully crafted over the years.

Sam inhaled sharply, drawing himself to his full height, looming above his older brother, almost threateningly. His fists lightly balled, he leaned in even closer. "Well, Dean, I'm waiting! What's wrong with me according to my big brother?"

"Sam, it's just that you were always on me about being careful with people. Like that Croatoan mess, when you were so afraid I was going to waste that kid from your vision. You wouldn't let me finish that asshole, Gordon, even when he nearly blew you to smithereens!" Dean stopped for a moment watching Sam's eyes and facial expression to see if any of this was even registering.

"And…?" Sam's expression remained blankly defiant.

"And… Well, first there was Jake... Man, he was dead in an instant! You never even flinched!" A look of pain filled Dean's concerned eyes.

Sam jumped into the verbal fray with both feet. " Maybe we were looking at different Jakes there, Dean… Seemed to me that bastard had just enlisted in Hell's damned demon army, big brother. Opened the fucking gates of Hell, possibly ending the world, as we know it. What the fuck was I supposed to do? Give him a medal? Buy him a drink? Well… What?"

Seeing Dean, open-mouthed, at a loss for words, Sam continued, "Well? You knew he had killed me, what the fuck were you going to do to him? Take him out to breakfast? I just got that bastard in my sights before you did was all! Not one of us four would have left that murderous traitor breathing, and you know that!"

Swallowing hard, Dean had to admit Sam was right. "But, Sam, then the seven deadly sins came. I saved the blond chick, Bobby saved his human, but yours were all... dead. Later, you took out that bartender broad and the Reverend without even batting an eyelash! …And now, Gordon!"

The fight seemed to go out of Sam as he swept the weapons aside, and dropped onto the side of Dean's bed, to face his brother on a more equal level. He took several breaths trying to gather his thoughts so they would make sense to his clearly, ill-at-ease brother.

"Dean, I wasn't the only one with those three demons. You forget it was Ruby's knife took them all out. That dark-haired bitch and the Reverend had already escaped from your Devil's Trap, our only real defense against them, and when I ran in there you were being held in the air by your throat, having the life squeezed out of you! What would you have done to save me?"

Dean's expression softened as Sam went on, "Gordon… Hell, that one scared even me! He had just murdered several people, was going to kill me. Then in an instant, had you in his grip and was in the act of tearing your throat open when I killed that toothy inhuman bastard!"

Dean had leaned forward cupping a comforting hand around the back of his little brother's neck, as Sam's head dropped into his now trembling hands. Those large, strong hands still bore the remnants of the deep cuts the razorwire had inflicted, as Sam used it to strangle and decapitate the vampire, Gordon.

"Dean, I don't know… People can exhibit super-human strength during times of unbelievable stress or rage. People have picked up cars that were pinning loved ones… Maybe it was seeing Gordon tearing at you like that… I don't know. I showed some weird powers when Max was going to kill you in Michigan, remember? Maybe Gordon's death was tied into that." He turned pleading eyes on Dean.

By then, Dean had edged forward and wrapped a supportive arm across Sam's broad shoulders. "Sam, I just don't know what to think. I never told you this before, but old Yellow-Eyes said something right before I shot him. He asked me how sure I was that the _Sam_ I brought back from death was the 'same' Sammy from before my deal. This stuff lately has had me so confused. I'm sorry."

Closing his suddenly tear-filled eyes against such gut-wrenching news, Sam breathed quietly for a few seconds. Perhaps the time had finally arrived to clear the air of other little secrets.

Turning his teary eyes to look at Dean's tortured face, Sam spoke his own little revelation. "Dean, I never told you what the demon 'Pride' told me when they had me cornered." Sam paused gathering his words, "There is some division in the demon world. Some took Yellow-Eyes' side. 'Pride' said I was that group's 'boy-king', so they're after me. The other group wants me, too… Dead! Like 'Pride', a lot of that group escaped from hell that night as well. Dean, I don't know what else to do. I _WANT_ to kill the ones that would follow me, because I don't want to be part of that. And… I _HAVE_ to kill the ones who want me dead, just to survive. How should I handle this?"

Hearing Dean's gasp at his tormented words, Sam grabbed Dean's free hand in one of his. Their eyes fastened onto one another's faces, both their tears brimming along their thick lashes, brotherly love longing to comfort and be comforted.

In those brief moments their mutual silence spoke more than words could ever say. A quiet understanding passed between the brothers as they clung to one another like lifelines, each gaining a deeper understanding of the recent past, perhaps an understanding to help them deal with the future.

Dean silently committed to backing Sam's actions completely, now that he recognized Sam's motives. He would help Sam survive this demonic plague, come hell or high water!

Sam, on the other hand, came to realize the reasons Dean had worked so hard at distancing Sam from Dean's future trouble. Sam armed himself with those doubts old Yellow-Eyes had planted in his beloved brother's mind and made up his own mind that come hell or high water he would be at his brother's side whether dead or alive.

The Winchester brothers were in this war together, soldier-brother beside soldier-brother. Joined forever, inseparably at the heart, they were in this for one another.

_Come hell or high water!_


End file.
